Questioning Senator Graham

Senator Lindsey Graham of the US Congress questions Secretary of Defense Ash Carter on the links between Kurdish groups in Turkey and those fighting ISIS in Syria back in April. (full transcript here, pp 98-101). Turkish media went agog, and they still do, about Secretary Carter’s admission of the links which has long been an open secret.

There are other open secrets too. Turkey’s alliance with al-Qaeda affiliated al-Nusra terrorists, which is on the US terrorist lists, is well-known to all political actors and people following the events. Turkey’s blind eye to ISIS jihadism and its hand-in-glove fight against it was also witnessed by the world in Jarablus. Turkish military and al-Qaeda terrorists took the town without firing a shot. There are credible reports that ISIS fighters simply switched sides in Jarablus.

What is interesting in Senator Graham’s questioning of Secretary Carter is that he seems to care more about the open secret bothering the Turks than those that should bother Americans. According to Senator Graham, a ‘dumb policy’ is when the US supports the YPG who are fighting for a secular democratic government in Syria. The US support for Turkey, which supports enemies of America and the YPG, is not dumb policy by his reckoning.

If I were a journalist with an opportunity to question Senator Graham, it would be as follows:

Q1: Senator, is al-Qaeda responsible for killing Americans?

Q2: Is al-Nusra Front on the US terror list as the Syrian arm of al-Qaeda?

Q3: Is Turkey supporting al-Nusra and other jihadi rebels fighting our allies in the Kurdish YPG and Kurdish-Arab alliance of SDF?

Q4: Then how dumb is it that the US should let Turkey and our jihadi terrorist enemies kill our secular Kurdish friends?